Russian Interference

Forbes and the New York Times report according to former FBI and Justice Department officials, the Mueller probe was limited to criminal misconduct regarding interference with the 2016 elections and told to disregard any links between the president and Russia.

“‘Do your job and then shut it down,’ Rosenstein allegedly told Mueller, according to a book by journalist Jeffrey Toobin, with Andrew McCabe, the acting bureau director at the time, telling the Times that limiting the focus to crimes runs counter to an investigation over national security, including potential compromised financial relationships.”

Mueller stated during a July 2019 House judiciary committee that his report did not exonerate Trump “for the acts that he allegedly committed” and that he was not indicted because the Office of Legal Counsel’s opinion states criminal charges cannot be brought against a sitting president.

The list of indictments from the Mueller probe are as follows

  • Paul Manafort was found guilty of 8 charges including multiple counts of false income tax returns, failure to file reports of foreign bank accounts, and bank fraud.
  • Rick Gates plead guilty to making false statements about financial crimes and unregistered foreign lobbying.
  • US Army Lt General Michael Flynn plead guilty to making false statements about his lobbying for the Republic of Turkey and to asking the Russian ambassador to ignore sanctions by the Obama administration.
  • Roger Stone was convicted on 5 counts of making false statements, one count of obstruction of justice and one count of witness tampering.
  • Michael Cohen plead guilty to one count of making false statements to Congress.
  • George Papadopoulos was found guilty of lying to the FBI.
  • Alex Van Der Zwaan was plead guilty to lying to Federal officials about his ties to Rick Gates.
  • Richard Pinedo plead guilty to one count of identity fraud
  • 3 Russian Companies and 13 Russian individuals have been charged with Conspiracy to Defraud the United States. The main company, Internet Research Agency (IRA), is a St Petersburg company whose leader is Yevgeniy Prigozhin. is purported to be a close associate of Vladimir Putin. Another Russian firm called Concord Management and Consulting, LLC is the only one to have challenged the indictment.

So, after hashing all this out, we can determine there was a Russian attempt to influence voters during the 2016 elections. The other thing we can conclude is it did not work. Trump did not win the majority; he lost the popular vote by 3 million.

HOME